


badwater

by SeinenLuver69 (yareyareyumi)



Category: Golden Kamuy, ゴールデンカムイ | Golden Kamuy (Manga)
Genre: Illustrations, Introspection, M/M, Tsukishima Hajime-centric, gk 231, loving is hard. being loved is hard., non-illustrated version too, slight au - koitsuki's in a physical relationship that started in karafuto, tsukishima is a sad and violent man, very dark thoughts and exploration of trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:27:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28022400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yareyareyumi/pseuds/SeinenLuver69
Summary: Eleven years is enough to set a man’s life firmly in stone and in damnation. Eleven years is enough to wear down a man enough to listen to the first person who says he should do better, and, after seven days, want to agree.Tsukishima is a bad man. Koito isn’t, as much. They wait in the kotan for their prey to flee.Illustrated vers/non-illustrated vers.
Relationships: Koito Otonoshin/Tsukishima Hajime
Comments: 17
Kudos: 59





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Best viewed on desktop/laptop: this fic has a lot of art, and the sizing doesn't work well on mobile. I know it's a lot to ask (bcse reading fic on mobile's comfortable) but it's worth it, i promise. Or, you can just go to chpt 2 (non-illustrated vers). 
> 
> Slight AU: koitsuki’s had a (strictly) physical relationship since Karafuto. A la “two military officers blowing off stress w physical activity.” 
> 
> This sure is a lot of nothing happening in terms of plot. But, I had a lot of melodramatic thoughts after reading 231, and here they are. Uhh, don’t read this before 231? Or do! You won’t understand anything, but fuck coherency. Stick it to the man (me). 
> 
> I want to see the Koitsuki theatre to the end, from the best seats in the house.

Otaru’s nights were chilly, but nothing worth complaining about. 

“It’s freezing! Tsukishima, let’s share body heat,” Koito said the first night, throwing off his blanket and pulling himself closer using his elbows before Tsukishima could even respond.

Tsukishima—who had gotten many complaints about his cold feet from different bunkmates over the years—held himself still as the Second Lieutenant vigorously tugged his _futon_ out from under him.

“Watch your wound, Second Lieutenant,” Tsukishima said, as Koito churned their quilts into a messy, half-pile. 

“Much better, isn’t it, Tsukishima?” Koito said, smugly, when their bodies were pressed together. 

Tsukishima did not respond as a long strip of his body, shoulder to toe, coverless, dropped rapidly in temperature. 

The Ainu house that Sawamura had stayed in, and that Koito and Tsukishima had thrown him out of, had a fire pit, just like all the others in the _kotan_. But, the chill wasn’t anything comparable to that of Manchuria’s earth, which froze men into stiff corpses within minutes of touching the ground, and Second Lieutenant Koito had nearly set his sleeves alight earlier when attempting to start a fire. So, that night, Tsukishima experienced Otaru’s natural nighttime temperature in full. 

“This cold is ridiculous,” Koito hissed directly into his ear. “Do you suppose Sawamura drank so much to keep himself warm?” 

“I think he drank to get drunk, sir,” Tsukishima said. “I’ll ask around for matches tomorrow.” 

“The Ainu have matches?” Koito sounded genuinely surprised. “Of course. There’s no way anyone could start a fire with that strange tool.” 

“They are Japanese citizens, too, sir, with access to everything we have. Their community is remote, but it isn't isolated. The local Ainu often go to Otaru to sell pelts and meat,” Tsukishima said. 

“Do you suppose I could ask one of the villagers to bring me back a hand mirror? I haven’t been able to groom properly for days,” Koito said, hooking one leg around Tsukishima’s own, before shaking in a dramatic shudder that travelled the entire length of his body. “Tsukishima! Your feet are freezing!”

“Sorry, sir,” Tsukishima said. 

If that was an indirect order to stop his feet from freezing, there was little he could do. 

Koito sighed and shifted—Tsukishima felt the Second Lieutenant hadn’t stopped wriggling since he’d decided the two of them were going to share body heat—kicking Tsukishima in the ankle a few times. Two feet, strangely boney and long, with soles relatively uncalloused for that of a soldier, sandwiched themselves around Tsukishima’s own. 

Koito shuddered, full-body, again, as if he had just stuck his feet into ice water. 

“Sir, what are you doing?” Tsukishima asked. 

“I’m warming up your feet. They’re simply—” Koito hissed again. “Do you stuff your boots with snow, Sergeant?” 

“No, sir,” Tsukishima said. “My feet are normally very cold. Really, I’m fine. Please don’t feel the need to try to warm me up.” 

The feet pressed together even more firmly, and the Second Lieutenant let out another hiss. 

“Second Lieutenant—” 

“Quiet, Tsukishima. So long as you are one of my men and we share the same bed, the temperature of your feet impacts my comfort,” Koito said. “Any further complaints?” 

“None, sir,” Tsukishima said, and he was so tired that it was only partially a lie. 

Koito made a self-satisfied noise, and Tsukishima lay there, feeling like a herring being pinched by its tail, as he waited for his superior officer’s breathing to even out. 

\---

The next morning, the Second Lieutenant was unusually quiet, and he said little aside from a few customary orders. Tsukishima caught him staring mutely into the distance, in the direction of, but not at, the dull-green, forest-carpeted mountains that formed the horizon on all sides. 

They had a rough outline of a cover story drafted between the two of them, and it was one that required them to stay in the _kotan._ The Ainu could be trusted to keep their lips sealed, but things would quickly get complicated if an outsider spotted them. This meant no trips into Otaru and no venturing out to hunt, which meant choking down whatever Sawamura had left behind. 

Tsukishima watched Koito, who stared fixedly at a spot in the air as he nibbled on Sawamura’s poorly stored rations and made a simultaneously disgusted and absent-minded face. 

“No wonder Sawamura slacked so shamelessly. This tastes disgusting,” Koito said. 

He took another bite and grimaced as if offended the flavor hadn't suddenly improved since his last bite. 

“Endure it, sir. We’ll have to wait until the villagers make their next trip into town.”

Tsukishima watched Koito, eyes glazed over, let what had probably once been an _umeboshi_ drop to the ground and open his mouth, preparing to sink his teeth into his chopsticks. Tsukishima grabbed his wrist, stopping him from a painful clacking of teeth against wood. 

“Are you alright, Second Lieutenant?” 

“I’m fine, just thinking some things over. You’re always such a mother hen, Tsukishima,” Koito said. 

The Second Lieutenant loudly hucked up saliva like a common soldier, then spit on the ground with a jarring, delicate ‘ptoo.’ 

“This isn’t even suitable to feed to criminals on death row.” 

Tsukishima, who could attest similarly but with first-hand experience, made no comment, only a mental note to acquire something edible before the Second Lieutenant started gnawing on his mess tin. 

He didn’t plan to interfere with whatever the Second Lieutenant was pondering. If it wasn’t something life-threatening, his superior officer could afford to bumble through it himself. 

Tsukishima—running their used mess tins under water—watched Koito walk solidly into the side of a house and come away with thatch in his hair and that same somber, absent-minded expression on his face. 

After he set their mess tins out to dry, Tsukishima approached the Second Lieutenant, who was chatting avidly with one of the Ainu men.

“—Yes, yes, and one with a handle, please. No, it’s not just for women. Men—refined men—use them plenty—” 

“Sir, I need to speak to you privately. Can you come with me?” 

When they were behind Sawamura’s house—the structure shielding them from the _kotan_ on one side, packed dirt leading into shaded woodland on the other—Koito looked at him expectantly with an uncharacteristic seriousness. Tsukishima closed the distance between them and dropped to his knees. 

“You looked tense, sir,” Tsukishima said, pushing aside the tails of the other man’s overcoat, with a motion that was now muscle memory, and working to unbutton Koito’s trousers. “Let me help.” 

He was on the third button when a hand settled on his shoulder, and he looked up. 

“Not today, Tsukishima,” Koito said, not meeting his eyes. 

The words were clear and firm; Koito seemed to have awakened an ingrained talent for giving orders in Karafuto. The hand, which drifted from his shoulder to loosely grasp and push at Tsukishima’s hands, was weak and hesitant. 

“Sorry, sir,” Tsukishima said, dropping his hands immediately.

He was long past shame—his childhood and Tsurumi’s trust had soundly beaten any semblance of it out of him. But, as he brushed off his trousers, Tsukishima felt as if he’d overstepped some boundary that he hadn’t known existed until he’d tripped over its wire.

He suddenly realized that he’d been following a routine for a different superior officer. First Lieutenant Tsurumi always enjoyed it most after chaos and blood had boiled to an unbearable point. It was a panting, screaming release, both a celebration and a purging of the painful ecstasy of battle. 

He’d assumed Koito—who’d first approached him after their chase for Asirpa had come to a messy, violent head, injuring several men and leaving one dead on the ice—had been similar. 

It had made sense to him. Koito, a military man, who salivated after the glory promised by war and idolized Tsurumi, of all men, would surely experience the rush of blood and loss of life as an aphrodisiac unlike any other. 

But, he’d been wrong. Tsukishima idly wondered for what reason Koito had sought out his company for, then. 

With his offer of assistance rejected, Tsukishima stood there stiffly. 

Second Lieutenant Koito was simple. Very few of his histrionics required anything more than a bromide of First Lieutenant Tsurumi to peter out. But, Tsukishima hadn't grabbed anything aside from his rifle, pistol, and ammunition on his mad tear after Tanigaki.

Second Lieutenant Koito was supposed to be easy—to pacify, that is. As his superior officer cleared his throat and looked everywhere but him, Tsukishima rather felt like he'd lost his handle on a dog he'd raised and tamed for years.

"I'm going to go see the baby," Koito said, stepping halfway out from the house’s shade and into the weak sunlight. "Do you want to come, Tsukishima?" 

"No. Thank you, sir," Tsukishima said. 

Tanigaki wouldn't be able to relax around the man who had been half a pause away from murdering him and capturing his wife, and Tsukishima would do nothing to make him believe he should. It wouldn’t end well. 

"Suit yourself. Do as you wish with your time, Sergeant. We’ll meet up again later for our evening meal," Koito said airily, his attention already seemingly elsewhere. 

Tsukishima couldn’t tell whether the Second Lieutenant’s strange mood had left him. Koito seemed to have shaken it off, but it could’ve been a facade, like the many others Tsukishima had recently discovered the other man capable of maintaining. It was strange, Tsukishima reflected, to think of someone, so dramatic and...loud, as inscrutable. 

He watched from the house’s shadow as Koito strode, with all the self-importance of someone going to greet the Emperor, down the dirt road that split the _kotan_ in half and towards _huci'_ s house. 

\---

Holding Tsurumi was holding the devil and an object of worship at the same time. Tsukishima’s hands—murderer’s hands that they were—always twitched with the urge to caress and strangle. 

Holding Koito was mundane. As he watched Koito stroke himself to completion, Tsukishima was confident that if the First Lieutenant were here, he would be bored out of his perforated skull. 

\---

“The baby’s healthy. Inkarmat hasn’t decided on a name yet. She says she has to pick one that’ll bring good fortune,” Koito shared over dinner—rice and eagle meat that Tsukishima had purchased, with the Second Lieutenant's money, from one of the villagers. “I, of course, am going to have a very fortunate month.” 

Tsukishima made a noise of acknowledgement, thinking it would take a very stupid fortune-teller to tell her savior to his face that he’d have anything but the most extraordinary luck—particularly if said savior was Second Lieutenant Koito. 

“They’ll be leaving in a few days, once they’re sure the baby’s ready to travel,” Koito said. “Tanigaki wouldn’t tell me where they’re heading.” 

“Tanigaki’s from some place in Akita, but if he has any brains left, he’ll stay away from the entire area. Nobody in the Army knows more about his past than First Lieutenant Tsurumi. And by now, he might even know more about Tanigaki’s hometown than Tanigaki himself," Tsukishima said. 

He’d been standing guard the night Tanigaki made his way to the First Lieutenant's office for some dango and polite conversation, to unspool his guts on the floor for Tsurumi to peruse in private. The First Lieutenant made a habit of dismantling his armaments before deciding upon their use, and every soldier in the Seventh had taken their turn in that small, yellow lit room. 

"Maybe Inkarmat’s village, wherever she’s from,” Koito said. 

“Inkarmat’s an orphan." 

"Oh." 

Koito was silent for a moment. 

"I can't imagine never going back to Kagoshima. It'd be difficult, being barred from your hometown." 

Tsukishima, pinching a particularly slippery piece of eagle meat and scraping it towards himself, thought of sea spray tinted by the stink of sun-baked seaweed and mucous rattling backed by the soft drip of lukewarm blood onto floorboards. 

"We can take a sabbatical and visit, after Lieutenant Tsurumi has secured the gold, of course." Koito turned to him, his haughty smile glistening with eagle grease. "They say Sakurajima is Japan’s most active volcano, Tsukishima. You've never seen anything like it." 

"I've seen it before, sir," Tsukishima said. “There was a lot of smoke." 

"Really? You don't strike me as the well-travelled type,” Koito casually insulted, squinting in his direction. “Ah, but I know you haven’t seen Hakodate.” 

"First Lieutenant Tsurumi had business there, once," Tsukishima said, as rice and meat slid slowly down his throat. 

He focused on Koito's expression as the other man processed what he'd said. 

"Ah," Koito said. Then, "Hm."

Tsukishima watched him. 

"But those hardly count as visits. If you were there for just a week and a half, and on duty too, you definitely didn't see anything worth seeing," Koito said, expression one of self-assured conviction. "And, more importantly, you didn't have me to guide you. You're due for another trip, to both Kagoshima and Hakodate, Sergeant." 

The Second Lieutenant was wrong, at least about Hakodate, Tsukishima thought, as he watched Koito reach for the meat again. He had spent weeks going over Hakodate’s map and its street layout, and then another full month in the port itself, on standby as, two floors above, the First Lieutenant bowed to and consoled the silent Lord Koito and his weeping wife. 

However, a thrashing, sixteen year old Koito Otonoshin kneeing him in the stomach didn't really count as him showing him around, Tsukishima conceded. In that light, he hadn't had the full Hakodate experience.

\----

It was another day; Tsukishima did as he'd done the previous: patrol the _kotan_ 's perimeter, rifle in hand, prepared to greet Sawamura or any other comrade from the Seventh who might decide to come calling ahead of schedule. 

He hadn't fully decided on what to do if he actually came across one of the Seventh—that is, how long to pause before pulling the trigger and where to aim. It would depend heavily on who had found them and why. Regardless, Tsukishima wasn’t prepared to die. 

His limbs still moved, and his eyes were still glued to Tsurumi’s back. 

Really, if he thought about it, nothing had changed. Perhaps he’d simply handed his reins over to another commanding officer, and Koito Otonoshin no less. 

As per usual, Tsukishima didn’t know where this would lead. The only thing he was fairly certain of was that his death had already been planned for him and that it would be—knowing the First Lieutenant—dramatic and with purpose, a beautifully executed move that those who could see the entire board would surely appreciate. His life hadn’t been his for a long time, and his death was the same. 

Tsukishima wasn’t prepared to die, but if he walked into Otaru with Koito to a neat line of muzzles and the First Lieutenant’s regretful smile, he wouldn’t feel much aside from dull acceptance. 

He was also prepared, alternatively, to walk into Sapporo and have Tsurumi gently nudge his hand—not left, not right—until his pistol settled perfectly between Koito’s eyes. 

The fact that he was prepared for anything was why he would never live any life other than this one, where his aim never wavered, where his targets were tragically brave, pregnant women, and where Igogusa sank somewhere, deep and lifelessly, below. 

While Tsukishima followed his self-appointed patrol, Second Lieutenant Koito occupied himself with distracting the attention of the incorrigibly curious Ainu children by making a loud and sore loser of himself at their local games. 

Tsukishima, from the trees bordering the _kotan_ , watched him shriek loudly and fall, back-first, to the ground. The local children—with an inappropriate lack of fear for a member of the Imperial Army, most likely cultivated by Tanigaki puttering about their village for months—laughed loudly, a few imitating the Second Lieutenant's famous scream. 

Koito lay unmoving on the open dirt, under the brightest light the weak sun could offer, surrounded by laughing children. Tsukishima could make out his fierce scowl as he picked himself up with stiff movements. He watched the Second Lieutenant, face on the brink of a snarl, mouth something angrily at a girl who barely stood up to his upper thigh. 

The girl handed him another hoop, and Tsukishima watched his superior officer, face twisted in concentration, wind his arm back and bring it down—with enough strength to hammer a man's sword guard into his skull—and fall on his front. 

The air erupted into noise again. The children's and the Second Lieutenant's shrieks filled the sky, as tangible in their disruption as smoke from a fire. Tsukishima turned away from it and sank a few paces deeper into the forest, continuing his loose circle around the _kotan_. 

\---

Koito said, idly, reaching for another piece of meat—otter, today—“I asked Inkarmat to read your fortune, too.” 

“You didn't need to, sir."

“She couldn’t, though. Or, she wouldn’t tell me. She said it was something she could only tell you in person,” Koito said, looking at Tsukishima seriously. “You should visit her, Tsukishima. Inkarmat’s fortune-telling is amazing. She predicted we’d have otter today.” 

“I’ll keep that in mind, sir,” Tsukishima said, thinking about how he’d very visibly purchased then walked across the _kotan_ with the otter. 

“Inkarmat wouldn’t say something like that unless what she saw was important. You should hear her out,” Koito said, setting down his bowl and bridging his chopsticks across the rim. 

Koito’s face, when it wasn’t contorted by excitement or screeching, was a somber and intense one, made dignified by furrowed eyebrows and deep-set eyes. His expression, as he looked at Tsukishima, made full use of these features to convey a surprising amount of gravitas. 

Tsukishima wondered at what point, among the recent bombardment of life-shaking revelations and life-threatening conflicts, Koito had grown into his own skin. He wondered what the final push had been and if there was another push, waiting in the wings, that would shatter the Second Lieutenant—as Tsurumi’s second truths had him so kindly, in Mukden—beyond repair and into malleability. 

“It’s not that simple, sir,” Tsukishima said, meeting his eyes. “I was about to kill them. And I still might. That sort of thing isn’t easy to forgive. Even you can understand that much.” 

“My resolve to follow First Lieutenant Tsurumi hasn’t wavered, and we’ll have to see what orders he gives us in the future. But, my previous order still stands, and I expect you to follow it, Sergeant,” Second Lieutenant Koito said. 

Koito’s expression then relaxed minutely. 

“I think you should hear what Inkarmat has to say,” Koito said. “Go see her, for your own sake, even if that makes you selfish, and even if you don’t have the right, after what you’ve done. I don't want to see you allow anything, even your own appropriate feelings of guilt, to hold you back from hearing something I think will bring you peace, Tsukishima.” 

The conversation dropped from there like a stone sinking into a stream, and Tsukishima didn’t bother to pick it up. He was too preoccupied with the Second Lieutenant’s words, which sank into him, to be smoothed out by currents or to weigh him down further, he wasn’t sure. 

\---

For many years, Tsukishima hadn’t tried to look at the path he was following. Even now, when he glanced downwards, he found the road directing his life to be muddled and blurred, as it had been ever since someone else had begun paving it for him. 

“I have every intention of watching both you and First Lieutenant Tsurumi to the very end,” Koito had said. 

Tsukishima wouldn’t ask Koito about his motives. The Second Lieutenant had professed loyalty to Tsurumi, and that was all that concerned him. Koito was a superior officer, and what he had disclosed to Tsukishima was all that he’d get and, thus, needed to know. 

\---

The week was drawing to a close. Sawamura would be returning from town at any time. 

Tsukishima didn’t pride himself in reading people like the First Lieutenant did—and his was a sleek, languid pride—but even he could sense the strange tension that had been building between him and Koito, becoming more and more tangible with each passing day. 

“Watch your wound, sir.” 

Even though Koito had rebuffed his offer to service him and hadn’t mentioned it since, every night, he pushed his and Tsukishima’s _futons_ together and made a conjoined mess of their quilts. 

Every evening, Tsukishima unrolled their _futons_ and made them with an appropriate distance in between. Every night, Koito tangled his limbs with Tsukishima’s and pressed his warm weight against him, shoving one of Tsukishima’s shoulders into the cold. Tsukishima didn’t understand this disconnect, but it wasn’t his place to acknowledge it, and the Second Lieutenant never did. 

Tsukishima did not pride himself in reading people. But, for all the hidden facets the Second Lieutenant had revealed himself capable of concealing, Koito was still overly expressive. Tsukishima could feel his eyes on him in the darkness, and he stayed obediently still when warm skin and cloth shifted against him and hot breath fanned over his face. 

Second Lieutenant Koito’s lips never chapped or peeled. The rich lived a different life, parallel to that of the common people's, one with copious amounts of vaseline. 

As he moved his mouth against Koito’s, Tsukishima felt a small measure of relief. The method hadn’t been wrong, merely the timing. As for why the timing had been wrong, it wasn’t his place to question. He hadn’t made an effort to understand the strange tension that had been building between the Second Lieutenant and him, and now he would never need to. Whatever the Second Lieutenant was experiencing could be cauterized, like any other lingering ghost from a battlefield or one birthed from a man’s own mind, with physical release. 

Tsukishima, he realized, was relieved, beyond the catharsis of finally receiving clear-cut orders, to know what Koito wanted and to be able to give to him. He moved a hand downwards, tugging at the other man’s _obi_. When the Second Lieutenant froze, he did as well. 

“Tsukishima,” Koito said, voice tight. 

Tsukishima withdrew his hand quickly. Misjudging once was bad enough; twice was unacceptable. 

“I’m sorry, sir. I don’t have an excuse. I was getting ahead of myself, and I misunderstood,” Tsukishima said, mind churning. “If I can ask, what is it you want me to do?” 

“I don’t—” Koito’s voice pitched upwards slightly, almost as if he was beginning a dramatic whine. “Can’t we simply hold each other? Like this?” 

Tsukishima couldn’t understand why the Second Lieutenant suddenly felt the need for his permission after half-crawling into Tsukishima’s _futon_ for five consecutive nights without an inkling of it. It was, much like Koito himself, ridiculous and strange in a way he didn’t bother to ponder further, for the sake of avoiding a headache. 

“Alright, sir.” 

“Good. First, change positions! I want _your_ arms around _me_.” 

Tsukishima, his confusion holding his annoyance at bay, waited for Koito to roll on his side and writhe fussily as he made himself comfortable. When his superior officer was done, he turned head over his shoulder, looking at Tsukishima expectantly. 

Reed mat crackled, and fabric whispered. Tsukishima followed his orders and reached under Koito’s arms to embrace the other man so that his chest was flush against Koito’s back. Koito cleared his throat pointedly, and Tsukishima lifted his leg to hook it loosely over the Second Lieutenant’s. The resulting position made him feel like a _tanuki_ clinging to the side of a tree trunk. Koito let out a hum, which Tsukishima took as a sign of contentment.

The house was finally quiet. In the absence of human voices and movement, the wilderness’s noises shyly crept back in. He could feel Koito’s heartbeat, faintly, through his _yukata_ , and the distant throb mixed together with the sluggish warmth that comes from human bodies. Tsukishima’s consciousness receded into sleep. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“I think I like you.”

Any shreds of sleep that had begun collecting in his mind vanished, and Tsukishima woke up, his blood going cold in a flash freeze that transformed water to ice in the blink of an eye.

“At first, I thought it was because I saw you as a brother. I had a big brother, you know, and he always looked out for me, even when I teased him. Just like you, Tsukishima.” 

\---

Tsukishima was in Yubari, deep in the collapsing mine, a light filter of grey that he couldn’t distinguish as coal dust or his vision going black filling his eyesight, taking deep and useless gulps of air that yielded no relief. 

\---

“But it’s not like that, I realized. I thought about it for a long time, and I finally understand. I care for Tsukishima, and I want you by my side. I don’t understand what burdens you, but I want to see you find happiness.” 

\---

His heart pounded in his ears, and he gripped the lumpy, leather handbag, worth more than his life, to his side with increasingly numb fingers.

\---

“Well.” Koito cleared his throat, and Tsukishima felt the sound vibrate in his chest. His tone was poorly, deceptively casual. “Ah. What do you think of that, Tsukishima?” 

\---

Even when he didn’t turn, he swore he could see, behind him, Yasaku Edogai’s smiling face, peering out at him from beneath the slats of collapsed beams, sinking slowly into the darkness as Tsukishima stumbled—with the same lack of hesitation he gave waxy corpses—away from him, leaving him to smile and rot for eternity. 

\--

“Tsukishima?”

“Stop talking,” Tsukishima snapped, before remembering himself. “Second Lieutenant, please excuse me. I didn't mean to imply that I could give you orders. But, I would strongly advise against—this.” 

Cold air hit his skin, and the muted warmth withdrew from him rapidly. Koito jerked himself out of Tsukishima’s arms, sitting up and partially flinging open the pile of quilts. 

“What is that supposed to mean? Advise? As if I can control how I feel, Tsukishima!”

Tsukishima felt something approaching relief settle heavily within him. Caring for him was a curse; the Second Lieutenant had been expressing resentment.

“Of course, sir. I was in the wrong.”

“No! Listen to me—” 

Koito was young—and passionate, and over-dramatic—and he grabbed Tsukishima by the shoulders. 

“I didn’t mean it like that. I simply care for you, and I needed you to know. What you feel for me is—I would like—but I. But I can’t order you to feel how I want you to feel.” 

He’d felt it, in another lifetime, as another man. 

He’d had it, in his hands, carding his fingers through Igogusa’s hair as it curled and caught around them in loving snarls. And he’d fought for it, knocked teeth in for it, slogged through Liaodong for it, saved each letter in his breast pocket to serve as tinder for it, raked the coastline for days on end—as sun and sea-water worked together to brine and crack his skin—for it, beat his father to death for it, punched his savior and superior officer for it, posed them perfectly for a shell blast—grabbing at the First Lieutenant’s jacket like a child—for it. 

And it had turned out that what Tsukishima had had was worth less than nothing. It had been destructive, ugly, and clumsy. It had confused him, put unfading scars on faces, and tired worry in her eyes. It had made him rant and rave uselessly on barren, grey earth as the bones of worthier men, around and under him, braced up the ground he stood on. 

On the other hand, what Koito was offering undoubtedly held a value that he would defend ferociously with his sabre. It would be a laughably cruel, and unfair, exchange. 

“I’ll send for a woman as soon as we’re in town. Bear with it for the next few days, Second Lieutenant.” 

“Tsukishima!” 

Koito sounded genuinely angered. 

“Don’t pretend to be a fool,” Koito said. 

“You don’t think this fondness for me grew on its own, did you, Second Lieutenant? You should know better by now,” Tsukishima said. 

“Just tell me you don’t feel the same,” Koito said, quieter. “If you don’t return my feelings, I’ll never mention them again.” 

“You’re letting Tanigaki go. Don’t make this any more complicated,” Tsukishima said. “Pick a path, Second Lieutenant Koito, your own or the one the First Lieutenant has made for you. Don’t jump back and forth between the two.” 

“I thought you were a man with enough decency to reject me upfront. What does the First Lieutenant have to do with how I feel—” Koito’s anger trailed off abruptly. 

Tsukishima imagined his face, stunned, twice-fold, by a betrayal that he should have easily deduced by now but, perhaps, had avoided considering. 

"You and I have made a choice, one that will likely end poorly,” Tsukishima said in his stunned silence. “The least you can do is avoid playing into First Lieutenant Tsurumi’s hand even further." 

"Is that what you thought you were doing? Staying with me as I made a mistake?” Koito finally said. 

“I made my own choice, sir. I followed you, and I will face the consequences,” Tsukishima said. 

There was a long pause. Koito’s hands tightened on his shoulders. 

“I can’t understand you.” Koito’s voice was full of frustration, and to Tsukishima, it sounded partially directed towards himself. “I thought I did, but now I realize I don’t even know where to begin. I thought you understood me, at least.”

Koito’s tone dropped into defeat. “I know my being your superior officer really doesn’t mean anything against the First Lieutenant’s orders. Tell me, Tsukishima, if I’m—if this was a mistake, why make it? Why did you spare them?” 

Because, Koito was right, in a way that went beyond logic, in a way that normal men, compassionate men, without murderers for fathers, seemed to be born understanding, in a way that war and the Army had done their absolute best to smother out every uniformed man’s awareness of. 

Because after countless orders entrusted to him in the dark, the kind of orders that would render weaker men unable to look at themselves in the daylight, Koito had ordered Tsukishima to stop. 

Koito was saying something. 

“I don’t know what you’ve done. All I know is what I’ve seen. You listened, and you stayed here, with me. I believe we made the correct choice, and I believe you agree with me, Tsukishima.”

Tsukishima didn’t reply. 

“And—” The hesitation and tightness in Koito’s voice made the taste of self-hatred, bitter, familiar, ever-present, rise up in the back of Tsukishima’s throat. “—I care for you, as one of my men, and more. Even if I wanted to, I can’t change or deny that.”

Tsukishima didn’t reply. Koito’s hands dropped from his shoulder completely. 

"Second Lieutenant Koito, are you going to sleep now?” Tsukishima said, breaking the silence—his mind full of numbness and white noise that he knew only he could hear. “Or do you want me to suck your dick and help you clear your head first, sir?

Koito stared at him mutely. His face was plunged in darkness, back facing what little light leaked through the doorway, but Tsukishima could imagine his expression, and he stared back at it, in the dark. 

“No.” Koito’s voice was normal and flat. “There’s no need for that. Go to sleep, Sergeant.” 

\---

Tsurumi had hollowed him out, chunk by chunk, tugging him back and forth between the dizzying peaks of pitch black despair and gut-wrenching hope. Up, down, and back again. 

Gratitude boiled into love, flared into hate, consumed him from within, driving him into a frenzy that gripped him like a wild beast until he collapsed in on himself, nothing but exhaustion and bitter, dedicated reverence dim in his mind. 

When _igogusa_ became a curse, snarls around his heart that Tsurumi had grabbed and twisted, he had kicked it all aside, like a patch of seaweed clinging to his ankle. He had rendered it meaningless through his own actions and crushed it beneath his heel because Tsurumi valued him and made hope a weeping wound in order to keep him. He had chosen emptiness over that enfeebling, invaluable pain. 

He looked up, with the last of his energy, at the glistening whites of eyes embedded in ridged flesh, and waited for him to reach his Grand End so that Tsukishima could finally give some meaning, any meaning at all, to all of—

“Lower your weapon. That’s an order,” Koito said. 

And Tsukishima let his limbs drop towards the ground as a sense of relief he didn’t understand or deserve overcame him. 

\---

Tsukishima got up the next morning, 

“Morning, sir.”

“Good morning, Sergeant.” 

They ate their first meal silently. 

“I’m going to see Inkarmat and Tanigaki. Come with me?” 

“No, thank you, sir.” 

“They’ll be leaving the _kotan_ soon, and so should we. Do whatever it is you need to do so that we’re ready to depart by tomorrow. I’ll see you at noon.” 

“Yes, sir.” 

They ate their midday meal silently. 

He passed Tanigaki on his way to cleaning the mess tins. For a split second, they paused in tense silence, regarding each other. Tsukishima gave Tanigaki a nod. Tanigaki did not return it. They walked on, giving each other a wide berth. 

The sun moved across the sky. 

Tsukishima trod his loose circle around the _kotan_. He spotted the Second Lieutenant talking to Tanigaki outside of _huci_ 's house. Tsukishima watched the two of them speak—their faces grave—exchange nods, then disappear back into the house. 

He held his rifle half-way up to his shoulder, and stared deep into layers upon layers of identical trees, eyes peeled for a flash of navy. 

They ate their evening meal silently. 

They turned in for the night. 

“Watch your wound, sir.” 

The night was quiet, without the sound of even breathing filling his ear. Both of Tsukishima’s shoulders were warm under his tightly tucked quilt. 

\---

Tsukishima was in the midst of a semi-restful doze when the Second Lieutenant’s silhouette separated from the floor. He heard rustling, moving from one end of the house to the other, before the reed mat covering the doorway lifted up, letting in a small gust of fresh air. 

As soon as the reed mat drifted back into place, Tsukishima rolled to his feet, shoving them into his shoes, and tugged up his gaiters. He threw on his coat and belt, picked up his rifle, slipped his hand under his pillow, and withdrew it with his pistol. 

The night was dark, the moon reduced to a skinny sliver. Tsukishima willed his eyes to adjust faster and made out the blurry figure of the Second Lieutenant, a few paces away. Keeping the distance between them, he followed, staying near the houses as he did. 

He did not crouch or slide up against the houses’ walls. If the Second Lieutenant spotted him, Tsukishima could claim plausible deniability against overdramatic accusations such as “stalking” and “being overprotective.” Superior officers tended not to admire well-executed stealth maneuvers if they were the targets. Those same superior officers appeared to believe walking alone into the Hokkaido wilderness in the middle of night, with a Type 26 at most, was a good decision, so Tsukishima didn’t give their opinions much weight.

He watched the Second Lieutenant reach the edge of the _kotan_ , where Ainu settlement ended and forest began. The Second Lieutenant paused, looked over his shoulder, and lit a lantern. Then, he walked forward. Clutching his rifle closer to himself, Tsukishima bent low to the ground and followed, shrinking the distance between them slightly. 

They walked through the thick mass of shapes that was the forest at night. Tsukishima stuck low to the ground, letting each step roll outwards to muffle their sound. 

Eventually, when the forest had swallowed them, and they’d picked their way through its bowels for an indeterminate amount of time, they reached a small clearing. Tsukishima stopped and dropped back, settling behind a tree and allowing the distance between them to stretch out. He watched the Second Lieutenant continue forward and walk into the clearing. 

The Second Lieutenant stopped in the center of the clearing, set his lantern down beside his feet, and tilted his head back, turning his face towards the sky. Tsukishima slowed his breathing, letting his breath pass through his nostrils. His knee pressed against damp tree bark. Everywhere around him, the forest’s blackness held him in place as he watched the Second Lieutenant stand there, in the only pale light to pierce the trees. 

“Come here, Sergeant.” 

Tsukishima hesitated, for a moment, before standing up. 

Koito continued to face the sky as Tsukishima walked up behind him. 

“Look, Tsukishima. It’s the moon.” 

It was. 

“Even when it’s dark now, the light will always come back,” Koito said, glancing at him significantly. “Even wild animals know this. Because, even when it’s a new moon, the light is always there, Tsukishima, ready to return, no matter how gradually. You have to remember that.” 

The Second Lieutenant was not a very subtle man. 

“Yes, sir,” Tsukishima said. 

Koito pointed excitedly. “And the rabbit who pounds _mochi_ will always be there too.” 

“Certainly, sir.” 

Koito huffed out a dramatic column of unfurling steam. 

“I’ve had my fill of staying in _kotans_ for the foreseeable future. There simply isn’t anything on par with a proper hotel and a hot bath. But, the wild does have a bizarre beauty to it, doesn’t it?” 

“It does, sir,” said Tsukishima, adjusting his grip on his rifle, remembering to sweep an eye behind them in case a member of said bizarre beauty—say, a bear—decided to barrel out of the trees and sample a chunk of the Second Lieutenant’s back. 

\---

The Second Lieutenant was childish, but he wasn’t innocent. Tsukishima’s first instinct had been to dismiss Koito’s point of view as naivety. But, by the time he’d stared down the barrel of Tsukishima’s pistol, Koito couldn’t have been called naive, not anymore. There’d been a clear tone to his voice that had made Tsukishima feel raw, like when he’d just come out of the baths, and his pink skin met cold air. 

It was a quality Tsukishima couldn’t understand or identify, and one he expected that he never would. 

If Tsurumi’s voice was soothing, Koito’s was grating. If Tsurumi’s voice was hypnotic and the slow seeping of water into earth, Koito’s was a jolt of clarity about as subtle as a ray of sunshine to the eye, first thing in the morning. 

Naivety got torn to shreds by the sort of life they led. Whatever the Second Lieutenant possessed had grown from, and only seemed to be polished by, the currents of deceit and murder. Tsukishima, wading through those very same currents, plunging in unclean and leaving even more tainted, could only watch, almost transfixed. 

\---

Koito always walked with long, graceful strides. Going downhill on a slope covered in thick Hokkaido forest translated those strides into a cacophony of crashes and snaps, and the Second Lieutenant planted boot after boot into foliage. Tsukishima was sure that every bear in Hokkaido, and Karafuto, had gotten wind of their presence by now, and he stuck to his superior officer’s side, keeping his finger on the trigger. 

“We’re leaving tomorrow,” Koito said. 

Tsukishima listened, expecting the long-awaited discussion regarding their next move and how they were to approach the First Lieutenant. 

“I can’t wait to sleep in a _proper_ bed again,” Koito sighed. “First that damned Sugimoto, and now hard-packed dirt every night. My back is never going to recover.” 

Koito turned, shoved one hand into his coat pockets, lifted the lantern upwards with the other, and smiled at Tsukishima. 

“Thank you for accompanying me, Tsukishima. Although I didn’t need the protection, I did enjoy the company.” 

  
“Certainly, sir,” Tsukishima said, as the grim image of a bear tossing the Second Lieutenant into the air flashed through his mind again. “If I may ask, couldn’t you have seen the moon from the _kotan_?” 

“I suppose I could have,” Koito said. “But I wanted to take a walk with you before we rejoined the First Lieutenant.” 

“With me, sir?” 

“Heh,” Koito said, to Tsukishima’s displeasure. 

The edge of his smirk was visible in the lantern’s trembling light. 

“Don’t be ridiculous. A good officer knows his subordinates. I knew you’d stalk me, Tsukishima. You’re so overprotective,” Koito said, smug. Then, less smug: “Besides, would you have come with me if I’d asked you directly?” 

Tsukishima probably wouldn’t have. He would have, politely, made it clear that it was a dangerous and unnecessary risk. But—and this was a realization that surprised Tsukishima himself the most—this was Koito, and that meant something different. 

“If you had asked me to, sir, I would have,” Tsukishima said. 

Koito looked at him so suddenly that Tsukishima heard the flap of his hair as the other man whipped his head around to face him. 

The lantern’s light rocked away from the Second Lieutenant, and Tsukishima couldn’t make out his expression in the dark. He waited for Koito to break the silence, but he didn’t, so Tsukishima did instead. 

“The _kotan_ should be just ahead, sir.” 

They made their way down the rest of the slope in a pseudo silence filled with the crash of Koito’s boots—violently—meeting vegetation and their stuttered breathing. 

\---

“Tsukishima,” Tsurumi moaned from somewhere above, muscles clenching and tensing as he ground down his hips in sinuous half-circles. 

“Tsukishima,” Koito said in what began as a moan and rose sharply in pitch into a small shriek, as he came on Tsukishima’s face with full-body shudders and small “Oh”s. 

“Good work, Sergeant,” Tsurumi said, as he smiled down at him and pushed sweat-slicked strands of hair that had come loose away from his face. 

“?!#$%$$?,” Koito screamed, as he scrubbed furiously at Tsukishima’s face with his sleeve, then looked down and shrieked even louder when he realized he’d just used his _yukata_ as a cleaning rag. 

“This mission with the Second Lieutenant, treat him well. A suggestion: be open to any possibilities. You know I’m not a jealous man,” Tsurumi said, settling his chin on steepled fingers and allowing his head to drop meaningfully to the side. 

“You’re not allowed to die on me, not on this mission or the next. That’s an order, you hear, Tsukishima?” Koito said, brow furrowed into agonizing lines, before leaning down and pressing a forceful kiss, which almost missed Tsukishima’s lips completely and barely snagged on a corner, on his mouth. 

\---

“Can I kiss you, Tsukishima?” 

“Yes, sir,” Tsukishima said. “Watch your wound, Second Lieutenant.” 

“First Lieutenant Tsurumi ordered you to do this, didn’t he. Before we left for Karafuto, if I had to guess,” Koito said quietly, waiting until they both settled on the _futons,_ before gently cupping Tsukishima’s chin and kissing him softly. 

“Yes, sir.”

Koito sighed. 

“What an insightful man.” 

He brushed a calloused thumb over Tsukishima’s cheek. 

“But, Tsukishima, if you were to want to be with me out of your own will, that would be nice, too.” 

Tsukishima felt his blood run cold. His hollowness returned with a voracious ferocity, and he felt as if he would cave inwards into soft pieces, like a rotten log, if Koito were to slightly tighten the arms around him. 

“That’s not possible, sir,” Tsukishima said, preparing to be shoved away. 

“There’s a lot I don’t know, isn’t there, Tsukishima,” Koito said instead, after a pause. 

Tsukishima’s chest felt as if it would burst open—cracked ribs and all—as a different kind of emotion filled him to an unbearable degree. Because he was a coward and a man who had cast aside everything he’d cared about and then ruined himself and others over the loss, he shoved the emotion deep down into the back of his throat. 

This is how they fell asleep: the Second Lieutenant and him, legs tangled loosely together, making a mess of their quilts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My research for this fic is absolutely lacking, esp for a Golden Kamuy fic, so apologies if anything was irritatingly inaccurate. And if you can, please let me know what I messed up on.
> 
> If you have any feedback at all, I'd love to hear it.
> 
> If you want to see all the art in one place, i posted them all on my art twitter (warning for gore/disturbing themes): Chn_Riff/status/ 1337611861911429120
> 
> Non-illustrated vers in chapter 2.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Non-illustrated version.

Otaru’s nights were chilly, but nothing worth complaining about. 

“It’s freezing! Tsukishima, let’s share body heat,” Koito said the first night, throwing off his blanket and pulling himself closer using his elbows before Tsukishima could even respond.

Tsukishima—who had gotten many complaints about his cold feet from different bunkmates over the years—held himself still as the Second Lieutenant vigorously tugged his  _ futon _ out from under him.

“Watch your wound, Second Lieutenant,” Tsukishima said, as Koito churned their quilts into a messy, half-pile. 

“Much better, isn’t it, Tsukishima?” Koito said, smugly, when their bodies were pressed together. 

Tsukishima did not respond as a long strip of his body, shoulder to toe, coverless, dropped rapidly in temperature. 

The Ainu house that Sawamura had stayed in, and that Koito and Tsukishima had thrown him out of, had a fire pit, just like all the others in the  _ kotan _ . But, the chill wasn’t anything comparable to that of Manchuria’s earth, which froze men into stiff corpses within minutes of touching the ground, and Second Lieutenant Koito had nearly set his sleeves alight earlier when attempting to start a fire. So, that night, Tsukishima experienced Otaru’s natural nighttime temperature in full. 

“This cold is ridiculous,” Koito hissed directly into his ear. “Do you suppose Sawamura drank so much to keep himself warm?” 

“I think he drank to get drunk, sir,” Tsukishima said. “I’ll ask around for matches tomorrow.” 

“The Ainu have matches?” Koito sounded genuinely surprised. “Of course. There’s no way anyone could start a fire with that strange tool.” 

“They are Japanese citizens, too, sir, with access to everything we have. Their community is remote, but it isn't isolated. The local Ainu often go to Otaru to sell pelts and meat,” Tsukishima said. 

“Do you suppose I could ask one of the villagers to bring me back a hand mirror? I haven’t been able to groom properly for days,” Koito said, hooking one leg around Tsukishima’s own, before shaking in a dramatic shudder that travelled the entire length of his body. “Tsukishima! Your feet are freezing!”

“Sorry, sir,” Tsukishima said. 

If that was an indirect order to stop his feet from freezing, there was little he could do. 

Koito sighed and shifted—Tsukishima felt the Second Lieutenant hadn’t stopped wriggling since he’d decided the two of them were going to share body heat—kicking Tsukishima in the ankle a few times. Two feet, strangely boney and long, with soles relatively uncalloused for that of a soldier, sandwiched themselves around Tsukishima’s own. 

Koito shuddered, full-body, again, as if he had just stuck his feet into ice water. 

“Sir, what are you doing?” Tsukishima asked. 

“I’m warming up your feet. They’re simply—” Koito hissed again. “Do you stuff your boots with snow, Sergeant?” 

“No, sir,” Tsukishima said. “My feet are normally very cold. Really, I’m fine. Please don’t feel the need to try to warm me up.” 

The feet pressed together even more firmly, and the Second Lieutenant let out another hiss. 

“Second Lieutenant—” 

“Quiet, Tsukishima. So long as you are one of my men and we share the same bed, the temperature of your feet impacts my comfort,” Koito said. “Any further complaints?” 

“None, sir,” Tsukishima said, and he was so tired that it was only partially a lie. 

Koito made a self-satisfied noise, and Tsukishima lay there, feeling like a herring being pinched by its tail, as he waited for his superior officer’s breathing to even out. 

\---

The next morning, the Second Lieutenant was unusually quiet, and he said little aside from a few customary orders. Tsukishima caught him staring mutely into the distance, in the direction of, but not at, the dull-green, forest-carpeted mountains that formed the horizon on all sides. 

They had a rough outline of a cover story drafted between the two of them, and it was one that required them to stay in the  _ kotan.  _ The Ainu could be trusted to keep their lips sealed, but things would quickly get complicated if an outsider spotted them. This meant no trips into Otaru and no venturing out to hunt, which meant choking down whatever Sawamura had left behind. 

Tsukishima watched Koito, who stared fixedly at a spot in the air as he nibbled on Sawamura’s poorly stored rations and made a simultaneously disgusted and absent-minded face. 

“No wonder Sawamura slacked so shamelessly. This tastes disgusting,” Koito said. 

He took another bite and grimaced as if offended the flavor hadn't suddenly improved since his last bite. 

“Endure it, sir. We’ll have to wait until the villagers make their next trip into town.”

Tsukishima watched Koito, eyes glazed over, let what had probably once been an  _ umeboshi _ drop to the ground and open his mouth, preparing to sink his teeth into his chopsticks. Tsukishima grabbed his wrist, stopping him from a painful clacking of teeth against wood. 

“Are you alright, Second Lieutenant?” 

“I’m fine, just thinking some things over. You’re always such a mother hen, Tsukishima,” Koito said. 

The Second Lieutenant loudly hucked up saliva like a common soldier, then spit on the ground with a jarring, delicate ‘ptoo.’ 

“This isn’t even suitable to feed to criminals on death row.” 

Tsukishima, who could attest similarly but with first-hand experience, made no comment, only a mental note to acquire something edible before the Second Lieutenant started gnawing on his mess tin. 

He didn’t plan to interfere with whatever the Second Lieutenant was pondering. If it wasn’t something life-threatening, his superior officer could afford to bumble through it himself. 

Tsukishima—running their used mess tins under water—watched Koito walk solidly into the side of a house and come away with thatch in his hair and that same somber, absent-minded expression on his face. 

After he set their mess tins out to dry, Tsukishima approached the Second Lieutenant, who was chatting avidly with one of the Ainu men.

“—Yes, yes, and one with a handle, please. No, it’s not just for women. Men—refined men—use them plenty—” 

“Sir, I need to speak to you privately. Can you come with me?” 

When they were behind Sawamura’s house—the structure shielding them from the  _ kotan _ on one side, packed dirt leading into shaded woodland on the other—Koito looked at him expectantly with an uncharacteristic seriousness. Tsukishima closed the distance between them and dropped to his knees. 

“You looked tense, sir,” Tsukishima said, pushing aside the tails of the other man’s overcoat, with a motion that was now muscle memory, and working to unbutton Koito’s trousers. “Let me help.” 

He was on the third button when a hand settled on his shoulder, and he looked up. 

“Not today, Tsukishima,” Koito said, not meeting his eyes. 

The words were clear and firm; Koito seemed to have awakened an ingrained talent for giving orders in Karafuto. The hand, which drifted from his shoulder to loosely grasp and push at Tsukishima’s hands, was weak and hesitant. 

“Sorry, sir,” Tsukishima said, dropping his hands immediately.

He was long past shame—his childhood and Tsurumi’s trust had soundly beaten any semblance of it out of him. But, as he brushed off his trousers, Tsukishima felt as if he’d overstepped some boundary that he hadn’t known existed until he’d tripped over its wire.

He suddenly realized that he’d been following a routine for a different superior officer. First Lieutenant Tsurumi always enjoyed it most after chaos and blood had boiled to an unbearable point. It was a panting, screaming release, both a celebration and a purging of the painful ecstasy of battle. 

He’d assumed Koito—who’d first approached him after their chase for Asirpa had come to a messy, violent head, injuring several men and leaving one dead on the ice—had been similar. 

It had made sense to him. Koito, a military man, who salivated after the glory promised by war and idolized Tsurumi, of all men, would surely experience the rush of blood and loss of life as an aphrodisiac unlike any other. 

But, he’d been wrong. Tsukishima idly wondered for what reason Koito had sought out his company for, then. 

With his offer of assistance rejected, Tsukishima stood there stiffly. 

Second Lieutenant Koito was simple. Very few of his histrionics required anything more than a bromide of First Lieutenant Tsurumi to peter out. But, Tsukishima hadn't grabbed anything aside from his rifle, pistol, and ammunition on his mad tear after Tanigaki.

Second Lieutenant Koito was supposed to be easy—to pacify, that is. As his superior officer cleared his throat and looked everywhere but him, Tsukishima rather felt like he'd lost his handle on a dog he'd raised and tamed for years.

"I'm going to go see the baby," Koito said, stepping halfway out from the house’s shade and into the weak sunlight. "Do you want to come, Tsukishima?" 

"No. Thank you, sir," Tsukishima said. 

Tanigaki wouldn't be able to relax around the man who had been half a pause away from murdering him and capturing his wife, and Tsukishima would do nothing to make him believe he should. It wouldn’t end well. 

"Suit yourself. Do as you wish with your time, Sergeant. We’ll meet up again later for our evening meal," Koito said airily, his attention already seemingly elsewhere. 

Tsukishima couldn’t tell whether the Second Lieutenant’s strange mood had left him. Koito seemed to have shaken it off, but it could’ve been a facade, like the many others Tsukishima had recently discovered the other man capable of maintaining. It was strange, Tsukishima reflected, to think of someone, so dramatic and...loud, as inscrutable. 

He watched from the house’s shadow as Koito strode, with all the self-importance of someone going to greet the Emperor, down the dirt road that split the  _ kotan _ in half and towards  _ huci' _ s house. 

\---

Holding Tsurumi was holding the devil and an object of worship at the same time. Tsukishima’s hands—murderer’s hands that they were—always twitched with the urge to caress and strangle. 

Holding Koito was mundane. As he watched Koito stroke himself to completion, Tsukishima was confident that if the First Lieutenant were here, he would be bored out of his perforated skull. 

\---

“The baby’s healthy. Inkarmat hasn’t decided on a name yet. She says she has to pick one that’ll bring good fortune,” Koito shared over dinner—rice and eagle meat that Tsukishima had purchased, with the Second Lieutenant's money, from one of the villagers. “I, of course, am going to have a very fortunate month.” 

Tsukishima made a noise of acknowledgement, thinking it would take a very stupid fortune-teller to tell her savior to his face that he’d have anything but the most extraordinary luck—particularly if said savior was Second Lieutenant Koito. 

“They’ll be leaving in a few days, once they’re sure the baby’s ready to travel,” Koito said. “Tanigaki wouldn’t tell me where they’re heading.” 

“Tanigaki’s from some place in Akita, but if he has any brains left, he’ll stay away from the entire area. Nobody in the Army knows more about his past than First Lieutenant Tsurumi. And by now, he might even know more about Tanigaki’s hometown than Tanigaki himself," Tsukishima said. 

He’d been standing guard the night Tanigaki made his way to the First Lieutenant's office for some dango and polite conversation, to unspool his guts on the floor for Tsurumi to peruse in private. The First Lieutenant made a habit of dismantling his armaments before deciding upon their use, and every soldier in the Seventh had taken their turn in that small, yellow lit room. 

"Maybe Inkarmat’s village, wherever she’s from,” Koito said. 

“Inkarmat’s an orphan." 

"Oh." 

Koito was silent for a moment. 

"I can't imagine never going back to Kagoshima. It'd be difficult, being barred from your hometown." 

Tsukishima, pinching a particularly slippery piece of eagle meat and scraping it towards himself, thought of sea spray tinted by the stink of sun-baked seaweed and mucous rattling backed by the soft drip of lukewarm blood onto floorboards. 

"We can take a sabbatical and visit, after Lieutenant Tsurumi has secured the gold, of course." Koito turned to him, his haughty smile glistening with eagle grease. "They say Sakurajima is Japan’s most active volcano, Tsukishima. You've never seen anything like it." 

"I've seen it before, sir," Tsukishima said. “There was a lot of smoke." 

"Really? You don't strike me as the well-travelled type,” Koito casually insulted, squinting in his direction. “Ah, but I know you haven’t seen Hakodate.” 

"First Lieutenant Tsurumi had business there, once," Tsukishima said, as rice and meat slid slowly down his throat. 

He focused on Koito's expression as the other man processed what he'd said. 

"Ah," Koito said. Then, "Hm."

Tsukishima watched him. 

"But those hardly count as visits. If you were there for just a week and a half, and on duty too, you definitely didn't see anything worth seeing," Koito said, expression one of self-assured conviction. "And, more importantly, you didn't have me to guide you. You're due for another trip, to both Kagoshima and Hakodate, Sergeant." 

The Second Lieutenant was wrong, at least about Hakodate, Tsukishima thought, as he watched Koito reach for the meat again. He had spent weeks going over Hakodate’s map and its street layout, and then another full month in the port itself, on standby as, two floors above, the First Lieutenant bowed to and consoled the silent Lord Koito and his weeping wife. 

However, a thrashing, sixteen year old Koito Otonoshin kneeing him in the stomach didn't really count as him showing him around, Tsukishima conceded. In that light, he hadn't had the full Hakodate experience.

\----

It was another day; Tsukishima did as he'd done the previous: patrol the  _ kotan _ 's perimeter, rifle in hand, prepared to greet Sawamura or any other comrade from the Seventh who might decide to come calling ahead of schedule. 

He hadn't fully decided on what to do if he actually came across one of the Seventh—that is, how long to pause before pulling the trigger and where to aim. It would depend heavily on who had found them and why. Regardless, Tsukishima wasn’t prepared to die. 

His limbs still moved, and his eyes were still glued to Tsurumi’s back. 

Really, if he thought about it, nothing had changed. Perhaps he’d simply handed his reins over to another commanding officer, and Koito Otonoshin no less. 

As per usual, Tsukishima didn’t know where this would lead. The only thing he was fairly certain of was that his death had already been planned for him and that it would be—knowing the First Lieutenant—dramatic and with purpose, a beautifully executed move that those who could see the entire board would surely appreciate. His life hadn’t been his for a long time, and his death was the same. 

Tsukishima wasn’t prepared to die, but if he walked into Otaru with Koito to a neat line of muzzles and the First Lieutenant’s regretful smile, he wouldn’t feel much aside from dull acceptance. 

He was also prepared, alternatively, to walk into Sapporo and have Tsurumi gently nudge his hand—not left, not right—until his pistol settled perfectly between Koito’s eyes. 

The fact that he was prepared for anything was why he would never live any life other than this one, where his aim never wavered, where his targets were tragically brave, pregnant women, and where Igogusa sank somewhere, deep and lifelessly, below. 

While Tsukishima followed his self-appointed patrol, Second Lieutenant Koito occupied himself with distracting the attention of the incorrigibly curious Ainu children by making a loud and sore loser of himself at their local games. 

Tsukishima, from the trees bordering the  _ kotan _ , watched him shriek loudly and fall, back-first, to the ground. The local children—with an inappropriate lack of fear for a member of the Imperial Army, most likely cultivated by Tanigaki puttering about their village for months—laughed loudly, a few imitating the Second Lieutenant's famous scream. 

Koito lay unmoving on the open dirt, under the brightest light the weak sun could offer, surrounded by laughing children. Tsukishima could make out his fierce scowl as he picked himself up with stiff movements. He watched the Second Lieutenant, face on the brink of a snarl, mouth something angrily at a girl who barely stood up to his upper thigh. 

The girl handed him another hoop, and Tsukishima watched his superior officer, face twisted in concentration, wind his arm back and bring it down—with enough strength to hammer a man's sword guard into his skull—and fall on his front. 

The air erupted into noise again. The children's and the Second Lieutenant's shrieks filled the sky, as tangible in their disruption as smoke from a fire. Tsukishima turned away from it and sank a few paces deeper into the forest, continuing his loose circle around the  _ kotan _ . 

\---

Koito said, idly, reaching for another piece of meat—otter, today—“I asked Inkarmat to read your fortune, too.” 

“You didn't need to, sir."

“She couldn’t, though. Or, she wouldn’t tell me. She said it was something she could only tell you in person,” Koito said, looking at Tsukishima seriously. “You should visit her, Tsukishima. Inkarmat’s fortune-telling is amazing. She predicted we’d have otter today.” 

“I’ll keep that in mind, sir,” Tsukishima said, thinking about how he’d very visibly purchased then walked across the  _ kotan  _ with the otter. 

“Inkarmat wouldn’t say something like that unless what she saw was important. You should hear her out,” Koito said, setting down his bowl and bridging his chopsticks across the rim. 

Koito’s face, when it wasn’t contorted by excitement or screeching, was a somber and intense one, made dignified by furrowed eyebrows and deep-set eyes. His expression, as he looked at Tsukishima, made full use of these features to convey a surprising amount of gravitas. 

Tsukishima wondered at what point, among the recent bombardment of life-shaking revelations and life-threatening conflicts, Koito had grown into his own skin. He wondered what the final push had been and if there was another push, waiting in the wings, that would shatter the Second Lieutenant—as Tsurumi’s second truths had him so kindly, in Mukden—beyond repair and into malleability. 

“It’s not that simple, sir,” Tsukishima said, meeting his eyes. “I was about to kill them. And I still might. That sort of thing isn’t easy to forgive. Even you can understand that much.” 

“My resolve to follow First Lieutenant Tsurumi hasn’t wavered, and we’ll have to see what orders he gives us in the future. But, my previous order still stands, and I expect you to follow it, Sergeant,” Second Lieutenant Koito said. 

Koito’s expression then softened. 

“I think you should hear what Inkarmat has to say,” Koito said. “Go see her, for your own sake, even if that makes you selfish, and even if you don’t have the right, after what you’ve done. I don't want to see you allow anything, even your own appropriate feelings of guilt, to hold you back from hearing something I think will bring you peace, Tsukishima.” 

The conversation dropped from there like a stone sinking into a stream, and Tsukishima didn’t bother to pick it up. He was too preoccupied with the Second Lieutenant’s words, which sank into him, to be smoothed out by currents or to weigh him down further, he wasn’t sure. 

\---

For many years, Tsukishima hadn’t tried to look at the path he was following. Even now, when he glanced downwards, he found the road directing his life to be muddled and blurred, as it had been ever since someone else had begun paving it for him. 

“I have every intention of watching both you and First Lieutenant Tsurumi to the very end,” Koito had said. 

Tsukishima wouldn’t ask Koito about his motives. The Second Lieutenant had professed loyalty to Tsurumi, and that was all that concerned him. Koito was a superior officer, and what he had disclosed to Tsukishima was all that he’d get and, thus, needed to know. 

\---

The week was drawing to a close. Sawamura would be returning from town at any time. 

Tsukishima didn’t pride himself in reading people like the First Lieutenant did—and his was a sleek, languid pride—but even he could sense the strange tension that had been building between him and Koito, becoming more and more tangible with each passing day. 

“Watch your wound, sir.” 

Even though Koito had rebuffed his offer to service him and hadn’t mentioned it since, every night, he pushed his and Tsukishima’s  _ futons _ together and made a conjoined mess of their quilts. 

Every evening, Tsukishima unrolled their  _ futons _ and made them with an appropriate distance in between. Every night, Koito tangled his limbs with Tsukishima’s and pressed his warm weight against him, shoving one of Tsukishima’s shoulders into the cold. Tsukishima didn’t understand this disconnect, but it wasn’t his place to acknowledge it, and the Second Lieutenant never did. 

Tsukishima did not pride himself in reading people. But, for all the hidden facets the Second Lieutenant had revealed himself capable of concealing, Koito was still overly expressive. Tsukishima could feel his eyes on him in the darkness, and he stayed obediently still when warm skin and cloth shifted against him and hot breath fanned over his face. 

Second Lieutenant Koito’s lips never chapped or peeled. The rich lived a different life, parallel to that of the common people's, one with copious amounts of vaseline. 

As he moved his mouth against Koito’s, Tsukishima felt a small measure of relief. The method hadn’t been wrong, merely the timing. As for why the timing had been wrong, it wasn’t his place to question. He hadn’t made an effort to understand the strange tension that had been building between the Second Lieutenant and him, and now he would never need to. Whatever the Second Lieutenant was experiencing could be cauterized, like any other lingering ghost from a battlefield or one birthed from a man’s own mind, with physical release. 

Tsukishima, he realized, was relieved, beyond the catharsis of finally receiving clear-cut orders, to know what Koito wanted and to be able to give to him. He moved a hand downwards, tugging at the other man’s  _ obi _ . When the Second Lieutenant froze, he did as well. 

“Tsukishima,” Koito said, voice tight. 

Tsukishima withdrew his hand quickly. Misjudging once was bad enough; twice was unacceptable. 

“I’m sorry, sir. I don’t have an excuse. I was getting ahead of myself, and I misunderstood,” Tsukishima said, mind churning. “If I can ask, what is it you want me to do?” 

“I don’t—” Koito’s voice pitched upwards slightly, almost as if he was beginning a dramatic whine. “Can’t we simply hold each other? Like this?” 

Tsukishima couldn’t understand why the Second Lieutenant suddenly felt the need for his permission after half-crawling into Tsukishima’s  _ futon _ for five consecutive nights without an inkling of it. It was, much like Koito himself, ridiculous and strange in a way he didn’t bother to ponder further, for the sake of avoiding a headache. 

“Alright, sir.” 

“Good. First, change positions! I want  _ your _ arms around  _ me _ .” 

Tsukishima, his confusion holding his annoyance at bay, waited for Koito to roll on his side and writhe fussily as he made himself comfortable. When his superior officer was done, he turned head over his shoulder, looking at Tsukishima expectantly. 

Reed mat crackled, and fabric whispered. Tsukishima followed his orders and reached under Koito’s arms to embrace the other man so that his chest was flush against Koito’s back. Koito cleared his throat pointedly, and Tsukishima lifted his leg to hook it loosely over the Second Lieutenant’s. The resulting position made him feel like a  _ tanuki _ clinging to the side of a tree trunk. Koito let out a hum, which Tsukishima took as a sign of contentment.

The house was finally quiet. In the absence of human voices and movement, the wilderness’s noises shyly crept back in. He could feel Koito’s heartbeat, faintly, through his  _ yukata _ , and the distant throb mixed together with the sluggish warmth that comes from human bodies. Tsukishima’s consciousness receded into sleep. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“I think I like you.”

Any shreds of sleep that had begun collecting in his mind vanished, and Tsukishima woke up, his blood going cold in a flash freeze that transformed water to ice in the blink of an eye.

“At first, I thought it was because I saw you as a brother. I had a big brother, you know, and he always looked out for me, even when I teased him. Just like you, Tsukishima.” 

\---

Tsukishima was in Yubari, deep in the collapsing mine, a light filter of grey that he couldn’t distinguish as coal dust or his vision going black filling his eyesight, taking deep and useless gulps of air that yielded no relief. 

\---

“But it’s not like that, I realized. I thought about it for a long time, and I finally understand. I care for Tsukishima, and I want you by my side. I don’t understand what burdens you, but I want to see you find happiness.” 

\---

His heart pounded in his ears, and he gripped the lumpy, leather handbag, worth more than his life, to his side with increasingly numb fingers.

\---

“Well.” Koito cleared his throat, and Tsukishima felt the sound vibrate in his chest. His tone was poorly, deceptively casual. “Ah. What do you think of that, Tsukishima?” 

\---

Even when he didn’t turn, he swore he could see, behind him, Yasaku Edogai’s smiling face, peering out at him from beneath the slats of collapsed beams, sinking slowly into the darkness as Tsukishima stumbled—with the same lack of hesitation he gave waxy corpses—away from him, leaving him to smile and rot for eternity. 

\--

“Tsukishima?”

“Stop talking,” Tsukishima snapped, before remembering himself. “Second Lieutenant, please excuse me. I didn't mean to imply that I could give you orders. But, I would strongly advise against—this.” 

Cold air hit his skin, and the muted warmth withdrew from him rapidly. Koito jerked himself out of Tsukishima’s arms, sitting up and partially flinging open the pile of quilts. 

“What is that supposed to mean? Advise? As if I can control how I feel, Tsukishima!”

Tsukishima felt something approaching relief settle heavily within him. Caring for him was a curse; the Second Lieutenant had been expressing resentment.

“Of course, sir. I was in the wrong.”

“No! Listen to me—” 

Koito was young—and passionate, and over-dramatic—and he grabbed Tsukishima by the shoulders. 

“I didn’t mean it like that. I simply care for you, and I needed you to know. What you feel for me is—I would like—but I. But I can’t order you to feel how I want you to feel.” 

He’d felt it, in another lifetime, as another man. 

He’d had it, in his hands, carding his fingers through Igogusa’s hair as it curled and caught around them in loving snarls. And he’d fought for it, knocked teeth in for it, slogged through Liaodong for it, saved each letter in his breast pocket to serve as tinder for it, raked the coastline for days on end—as sun and sea-water worked together to brine and crack his skin—for it, beat his father to death for it, punched his savior and superior officer for it, posed them perfectly for a shell blast—grabbing at the First Lieutenant’s jacket like a child—for it. 

And it had turned out that what Tsukishima had had was worth less than nothing. It had been destructive, ugly, and clumsy. It had confused him, put unfading scars on faces, and tired worry in her eyes. It had made him rant and rave uselessly on barren, grey earth as the bones of worthier men, around and under him, braced up the ground he stood on. 

On the other hand, what Koito was offering undoubtedly held a value that he would defend ferociously with his sabre. It would be a laughably cruel, and unfair, exchange. 

“I’ll send for a woman as soon as we’re in town. Bear with it for the next few days, Second Lieutenant.” 

“Ts ukishima!” 

Koito sounded genuinely angered. 

“Don’t pretend to be a fool,” Koito said. 

“You don’t think this fondness for me grew on its own, did you, Second Lieutenant? You should know better by now,” Tsukishima said. 

“Just tell me you don’t feel the same,” Koito said, quieter. “If you don’t return my feelings, I’ll never mention them again.” 

“You’re letting Tanigaki go. Don’t make this any more complicated,” Tsukishima said. “Pick a path, Second Lieutenant Koito, your own or the one the First Lieutenant has made for you. Don’t jump back and forth between the two.” 

“I thought you were a man with enough decency to reject me upfront. What does the First Lieutenant have to do with how I feel—” Koito’s anger trailed off abruptly. 

Tsukishima imagined his face, stunned, twice-fold, by a betrayal that he should have easily deduced by now but, perhaps, had avoided considering. 

"You and I have made a choice, one that will likely end poorly,” Tsukishima said in his stunned silence. “The least you can do is avoid playing into First Lieutenant Tsurumi’s hand even further." 

"Is that what you thought you were doing? Staying with me as I made a mistake?” Koito finally said. 

“I made my own choice, sir. I followed you, and I will face the consequences,” Tsukishima said. 

There was a long pause. Koito’s hands tightened on his shoulders. 

“I can’t understand you.” Koito’s voice was full of frustration, and to Tsukishima, it sounded partially directed towards himself. “I thought I did, but now I realize I don’t even know where to begin. I thought you understood me, at least.”

Koito’s tone dropped into defeat. “I know my being your superior officer really doesn’t mean anything against the First Lieutenant’s orders. Tell me, Tsukishima, if I’m—if this was a mistake, why make it? Why did you spare them?” 

Because, Koito was right, in a way that went beyond logic, in a way that normal men, compassionate men, without murderers for fathers, seemed to be born understanding, in a way that war and the Army had done their absolute best to smother out every uniformed man’s awareness of. 

Because after countless orders entrusted to him in the dark, the kind of orders that would render weaker men unable to look at themselves in the daylight, Koito had ordered Tsukishima to stop. 

Koito was saying something. 

“I don’t know what you’ve done. All I know is what I’ve seen. You listened, and you stayed here, with me. I believe we made the correct choice, and I believe you agree with me, Tsukishima.”

Tsukishima didn’t reply. 

“And—” The hesitation and tightness in Koito’s voice made the taste of self-hatred, bitter, familiar, ever-present, rise up in the back of Tsukishima’s throat. “—I care for you, as one of my men, and more. Even if I wanted to, I can’t change or deny that.”

Tsukishima didn’t reply. Koito’s hands dropped from his shoulder completely. 

"Second Lieutenant Koito, are you going to sleep now?” Tsukishima said, breaking the silence—his mind full of numbness and white noise that he knew only he could hear. “Or do you want me to suck your dick and help you clear your head first, sir?

Koito stared at him mutely. His face was plunged in darkness, back facing what little light leaked through the doorway, but Tsukishima could imagine his expression, and he stared back at it, in the dark. 

“No.” Koito’s voice was normal and flat. “There’s no need for that. Go to sleep, Sergeant.” 

\---

Tsurumi had hollowed him out, chunk by chunk, tugging him back and forth between the dizzying peaks of pitch black despair and gut-wrenching hope. Up, down, and back again. 

Gratitude boiled into love, flared into hate, consumed him from within, driving him into a frenzy that gripped him like a wild beast until he collapsed in on himself, nothing but exhaustion and bitter, dedicated reverence dim in his mind. 

When  _ igogusa _ became a curse, snarls around his heart that Tsurumi had grabbed and twisted, he had kicked it all aside, like a patch of seaweed clinging to his ankle. He had rendered it meaningless through his own actions and crushed it beneath his heel because Tsurumi valued him and made hope a weeping wound in order to keep him. He had chosen emptiness over that enfeebling, invaluable pain. 

He looked up, with the last of his energy, at the glistening whites of eyes embedded in ridged flesh, and waited for him to reach his Grand End so that Tsukishima could finally give some meaning, any meaning at all, to all of—

“Lower your weapon. That’s an order,” Koito said. 

And Tsukishima let his limbs drop towards the ground as a sense of relief he didn’t understand or deserve overcame him. 

\---

Tsukishima got up the next morning, 

“Morning, sir.”

“Good morning, Sergeant.” 

They ate their first meal silently. 

“I’m going to see Inkarmat and Tanigaki. Come with me?” 

“No, thank you, sir.” 

“They’ll be leaving the  _ kotan _ soon, and so should we. Do whatever it is you need to do so that we’re ready to depart by tomorrow. I’ll see you at noon.” 

“Yes, sir.” 

They ate their midday meal silently. 

He passed Tanigaki on his way to cleaning the mess tins. For a split second, they paused in tense silence, regarding each other. Tsukishima gave Tanigaki a nod. Tanigaki did not return it. They walked on, giving each other a wide berth. 

The sun moved across the sky. 

Tsukishima trod his loose circle around the  _ kotan _ . He spotted the Second Lieutenant talking to Tanigaki outside of  _ huci _ 's house. Tsukishima watched the two of them speak—their faces grave—exchange nods, then disappear back into the house. 

He held his rifle half-way up to his shoulder, and stared deep into layers upon layers of identical trees, eyes peeled for a flash of navy. 

They ate their evening meal silently. 

They turned in for the night. 

“Watch your wound, sir.” 

The night was quiet, without the sound of even breathing filling his ear. Both of Tsukishima’s shoulders were warm under his tightly tucked quilt. 

\---

Tsukishima was in the midst of a semi-restful doze when the Second Lieutenant’s silhouette separated from the floor. He heard rustling, moving from one end of the house to the other, before the reed mat covering the doorway lifted up, letting in a small gust of fresh air. 

As soon as the reed mat drifted back into place, Tsukishima rolled to his feet, shoving them into his shoes, and tugged up his gaiters. He threw on his coat and belt, picked up his rifle, slipped his hand under his pillow, and withdrew it with his pistol. 

The night was dark, the moon reduced to a skinny sliver. Tsukishima willed his eyes to adjust faster and made out the blurry figure of the Second Lieutenant, a few paces away. Keeping the distance between them, he followed, staying near the houses as he did. 

He did not crouch or slide up against the houses’ walls. If the Second Lieutenant spotted him, Tsukishima could claim plausible deniability against overdramatic accusations such as “stalking” and “being overprotective.” Superior officers tended not to admire well-executed stealth maneuvers if they were the targets. Those same superior officers appeared to believe walking alone into the Hokkaido wilderness in the middle of night, with a Type 26 at most, was a good decision, so Tsukishima didn’t give their opinions much weight.

He watched the Second Lieutenant reach the edge of the kotan, where Ainu settlement ended and forest began. The Second Lieutenant paused, looked over his shoulder, and lit a lantern. Then, he walked forward. Clutching his rifle closer to himself, Tsukishima bent low to the ground and followed, shrinking the distance between them slightly. 

They walked through the thick mass of shapes that was the forest at night. Tsukishima stuck low to the ground, letting each step roll outwards to muffle their sound. 

Eventually, when the forest had swallowed them, and they’d picked their way through its bowels for an indeterminate amount of time, they reached a small clearing. Tsukishima stopped and dropped back, settling behind a tree and allowing the distance between them to stretch out. He watched the Second Lieutenant continue forward and walk into the clearing. 

The Second Lieutenant stopped in the center of the clearing, set his lantern down beside his feet, and tilted his head back, turning his face towards the sky. Tsukishima slowed his breathing, letting his breath pass through his nostrils. His knee pressed against damp tree bark. Everywhere around him, the forest’s blackness held him in place as he watched the Second Lieutenant stand there, in the only pale light to pierce the trees. 

“Come here, Sergeant.” 

Tsukishima hesitated, for a moment, before standing up. 

Koito continued to face the sky as Tsukishima walked up behind him. 

“Look, Tsukishima. It’s the moon.” 

It was. 

“Even when it’s dark now, the light will always come back,” Koito said, glancing at him significantly. “Even wild animals know this. Because, even when it’s a new moon, the light is always there, Tsukishima, ready to return, no matter how gradually. You have to remember that.” 

The Second Lieutenant was not a very subtle man. 

“Yes, sir,” Tsukishima said. 

Koito pointed excitedly. “And the rabbit who pounds  _ mochi _ will always be there too.” 

“Certainly, sir.” 

Koito huffed out a dramatic column of unfurling steam. 

“I’ve had my fill of staying in  _ kotans _ for the foreseeable future. There simply isn’t anything on par with a proper hotel and a hot bath. But, the wild does have a bizarre beauty to it, doesn’t it?” 

“It does, sir,” said Tsukishima, adjusting his grip on his rifle, remembering to sweep an eye behind them in case a member of said bizarre beauty—say, a bear—decided to barrel out of the trees and sample a chunk of the Second Lieutenant’s back. 

\---

The Second Lieutenant was childish, but he wasn’t innocent. Tsukishima’s first instinct had been to dismiss Koito’s point of view as naivety. But, by the time he’d stared down the barrel of Tsukishima’s pistol, Koito couldn’t have been called naive, not anymore. There’d been a clear tone to his voice that had made Tsukishima feel raw, like when he’d just come out of the baths, and his pink skin met cold air. 

It was a quality Tsukishima couldn’t understand or identify, and one he expected that he never would. 

If Tsurumi’s voice was soothing, Koito’s was grating. If Tsurumi’s voice was hypnotic and the slow seeping of water into earth, Koito’s was a jolt of clarity about as subtle as a ray of sunshine to the eye, first thing in the morning. 

Naivety got torn to shreds by the sort of life they led. Whatever the Second Lieutenant possessed had grown from, and only seemed to be polished by, the currents of deceit and murder. Tsukishima, wading through those very same currents, plunging in unclean and leaving even more tainted, could only watch, almost transfixed. 

\---

Koito always walked with long, graceful strides. Going downhill on a slope covered in thick Hokkaido forest translated those strides into a cacophony of crashes and snaps, and the Second Lieutenant planted boot after boot into foliage. Tsukishima was sure that every bear in Hokkaido, and Karafuto, had gotten wind of their presence by now, and he stuck to his superior officer’s side, keeping his finger on the trigger. 

“We’re leaving tomorrow,” Koito said. 

Tsukishima listened, expecting the long-awaited discussion regarding their next move and how they were to approach the First Lieutenant. 

“I can’t wait to sleep in a  _ proper  _ bed again,” Koito sighed. “First that damned Sugimoto, and now hard-packed dirt every night. My back is never going to recover.” 

Koito turned, shoved one hand into his coat pockets, lifted the lantern upwards with the other, and smiled at Tsukishima. 

“Thank you for accompanying me, Tsukishima. Although I didn’t need the protection, I did enjoy the company.” 

  
“Certainly, sir,” Tsukishima said, as the grim image of a bear tossing the Second Lieutenant into the air flashed through his mind again. “If I may ask, couldn’t you have seen the moon from the  _ kotan _ ?” 

“I suppose I could have,” Koito said. “But I wanted to take a walk with you before we rejoined the First Lieutenant.” 

“With me, sir?” 

“Heh,” Koito said, to Tsukishima’s displeasure. 

The edge of his smirk was visible in the lantern’s trembling light. 

“Don’t be ridiculous. A good officer knows his subordinates. I knew you’d stalk me, Tsukishima. You’re so overprotective,” Koito said, smug. Then, less smug: “Besides, would you have come with me if I’d asked you directly?” 

Tsukishima probably wouldn’t have. He would have, politely, made it clear that it was a dangerous and unnecessary risk. But—and this was a realization that surprised Tsukishima himself the most—this was Koito, and that meant something different. 

“If you had asked me to, sir, I would have,” Tsukishima said. 

Koito looked at him so suddenly that Tsukishima heard the flap of his hair as the other man whipped his head around to face him. 

The lantern’s light rocked away from the Second Lieutenant, and Tsukishima couldn’t make out his expression in the dark. He waited for Koito to break the silence, but he didn’t, so Tsukishima did instead. 

“The  _ kotan  _ should be just ahead, sir.” 

They made their way down the rest of the slope in a pseudo silence filled with the crash of Koito’s boots—violently—meeting vegetation and their stuttered breathing. 

\---

“Tsukishima,” Tsurumi moaned from somewhere above, muscles clenching and tensing as he ground down his hips in sinuous half-circles. 

“Tsukishima,” Koito said in what began as a moan and rose sharply in pitch into a small shriek, as he came on Tsukishima’s face with full-body shudders and small “Oh”s. 

“Good work, Sergeant,” Tsurumi said, as he smiled down at him and pushed sweat-slicked strands of hair that had come loose away from his face. 

“?!#$%$$?,” Koito screamed, as he scrubbed furiously at Tsukishima’s face with his sleeve, then looked down and shrieked even louder when he realized he’d just used his  _ yukata _ as a cleaning rag. 

“This mission with the Second Lieutenant, treat him well. A suggestion: be open to any possibilities. You know I’m not a jealous man,” Tsurumi said, settling his chin on steepled fingers and allowing his head to drop meaningfully to the side. 

“You’re not allowed to die on me, not on this mission or the next. That’s an order, you hear, Tsukishima?” Koito said, brow furrowed into agonizing lines, before leaning down and pressing a forceful kiss, which almost missed Tsukishima’s lips completely and barely snagged on a corner, on his mouth. 

\---

“Can I kiss you, Tsukishima?” 

“Yes, sir,” Tsukishima said. “Watch your wound, Second Lieutenant.” 

“First Lieutenant Tsurumi ordered you to do this, didn’t he. Before we left for Karafuto, if I had to guess,” Koito said quietly, waiting until they both settled on the  _ futons, _ before gently cupping Tsukishima’s chin and kissing him softly. 

“Yes, sir.”

Koito sighed. 

“What an insightful man.” 

He brushed a calloused thumb over Tsukishima’s cheek. 

“But, Tsukishima, if you were to want to be with me out of your own will, that would be nice, too.” 

Tsukishima felt his blood run cold. His hollowness returned with a voracious ferocity, and he felt as if he would cave inwards into soft pieces, like a rotten log, if Koito were to slightly tighten the arms around him. 

“That’s not possible, sir,” Tsukishima said, preparing to be shoved away. 

“There’s a lot I don’t know, isn’t there, Tsukishima,” Koito said instead, after a pause. 

Tsukishima’s chest felt as if it would burst open—cracked ribs and all—as a different kind of emotion filled him to an unbearable degree. Because he was a coward and a man who had cast aside everything he’d cared about and then ruined himself and others over the loss, he shoved the emotion deep down into the back of his throat. 

This is how they fell asleep: the Second Lieutenant and him, legs tangled loosely together, making a mess of their quilts. 

**Author's Note:**

> My research for this fic is absolutely lacking, esp for a Golden Kamuy fic, so apologies if anything was irritatingly inaccurate. And if you can, please let me know what I messed up on. 
> 
> If you have any feedback at all, I'd love to hear it. 
> 
> If you want to see all the art in one place, i posted them all on my art twitter (warning for gore/disturbing themes): Chn_Riff/status/ 1337611861911429120
> 
> Non-illustrated vers in chapter 2.


End file.
